My favorite line in E.M. Forster’s
novel, A Room With a View, is when Freddy greets his new neighbor,
Emerson, by saying, “How d’ye do? Come and have a bathe.” Another
character present chuckles over the absurdity of such a greeting, but
nevertheless, they all go traipsing off to a nearby pond to have a jolly
good bath together. This leads to my favorite scene in the movie version,
where the men are nude and chasing each other around the pond (as naked
men are bound to do), only to be discovered by some fully-clothed and
proper neighbors who are out for a walk. The men yelp and try to hide
behind bushes while the women laugh into their parasols. Freddy’s mother
asks the obvious question, “Why not have a comfortable bath at home?”

So when our friend Charlie invited us
to go to a Chinese bathhouse, we had no idea what to expect, since bathing
together isn’t something we westerners normally go out of our way to do.
And even if we tried, the results would no doubt be disastrous and
humiliating, as my movie proves. But in China, bathhouses are quite
common and quite popular, so Zac and I agreed that it was high time we
found out what went on beyond the wavy concrete façade. Although we too
questioned, “Why can’t we take a comfortable bath at home?”

We selected Saturday evening, Zac’s
birthday, as the day to mark our entrance into the nude underworld of
Chinese bathhouses. We felt it was appropriate that Zac should enter his
27th year of life the same as the first: wearing nothing but
his birthday suit. Charlie had chosen to take us to one of Dalian’s most
luxurious bathhouses, the Golden Lotus. Many a foreigner before us had
ventured into this watery world, so we’d heard plenty of rumors. There
are saunas and steam rooms. There are prostitutes. You can get massages
and skin scrubbings. And above all, you have to get naked with a bunch of
other people. We were wary, but we entered the bathhouse with an open
mind.

Once inside the door, we were each
given a small towel and a rubber bracelet with our locker key and number
(which functioned as a charge account for any services received inside the
bathhouse). Then Zac and Charlie went into the male side, and Felicia and
I went into the women’s side. First we took off our shoes and they were
whisked away. Then we were led to our lockers. We each had a personal
attendant while we undressed, who took our clothes and put them into the
lockers for us. The interior was probably the cleanest, most beautiful
place I’d seen in Dalian; everything was polished and shining. And there
were mirrors everywhere. Whoever decorated the place evidently decided
that we liked to stare at ourselves and other people naked.

Once we too were fully naked, we were
led to the shower room and given some plastic sandals to wear. Each
shower was in a little alcove, but due to the abundance of mirrors, I
could watch Felicia showering and she could see me. There were so many
mirrors that everywhere you looked, you were confronted with nudity. In
each shower, there were numerous bottles of shampoos, conditioners, and
body washes and our small towels functioned as washcloths. While
showering, we had a generous view of naked women receiving skin scrubbings
by robust women wearing black bikinis. If these views seem the least bit
enticing to any of my male readership, just keep in mind that the vast
majority of the patrons at this expensive bathhouse were at least
middle-aged and were quite flabby and wobbly. It really made me fear
aging.

After showering, we tried the steam
room, which gave me uncanny insight into the life of a steamed dumpling.
It was painfully hot. Then we tried the sauna, which we could only
tolerate for about five minutes. After this, we took another shower
because we were all sweaty. Then, just to take advantage of all the free
services, we brushed our teeth. The attendants unwrapped the toothbrush
for us, put the toothpaste on, and filled a cup of water. The service was
so good it was ridiculous.

Having exhausted all the activities
doable in that room, we were given towels (or, more specifically, the
towels were put on us), and were led back to the locker area. There, a
dutiful attendant gave us some bathhouse clothes to wear: socks,
disposable underwear, shorts and a shirt. Finally relieved of our nudity,
we combed our hair and applied various lotions from the bountiful dressing
table, then we headed up the carpeted, mirror-lined stairs into the co-ed
lounge.

I will turn this e-mail over to Zac
now, for a description of the male side of the bathhouse.

The rectangular bathing room was very
large and well decorated. In the center of the room was a shallow
circular pool. Along the one of the long walls were around ten showering
pods. I followed Charlie, as I didn’t really know what to do and didn’t
want to break any protocol, if there was any. First to the showers; we
each grabbed our own pods. The men’s side wasn’t covered with mirrors and
so thankfully I couldn’t see any one else showering. The pods were,
however, open to the room so I could see everyone else. It was a nice
shower, as far as showers go but I ran out of things to wash and went to
see if Charlie was finished. He was still enjoying his shower so I went
to wait for him in the pool.

There were perhaps 20-30 men in the
room and there was only one other guy in the pool, although a few were
lounging on the wide rim. As soon as I took a dip it became clear that
the high temperature precluded any dawdling. After a minute or two
Charlie joined me and we talked for a bit. He translated the sign above
the pool: “Those with STD’s aren’t allowed in the pool.” We got out,
drank some complementary mineral water and headed over to the sauna.

I had been in a few saunas before but
this one seemed hotter than most. As Charlie and I sat, I told him that
in the USA it wasn’t common to be naked with other people, barring locker
rooms. I did say that the USA is more prudish than other western
countries. He was intrigued to find out that in Europe it’s possible to
find women going topless on the beach. I then tried to explain nudist
beaches but I was finding it difficult to concentrate in the humidity and
heat. Charlie must have been ready to leave for a while as I had to teach
him a new phrase, “high tolerance,” so he could praise me for staying
comfortable in the steamy room for so long.

I asked him what was normally next;
he said it was a massage. At the far end of the room was the massage area
with about ten massage beds. Charlie had said earlier that the massages
cost 100 RMB ($13) but in fact that was the price to have a young woman
erotically “massage” you for an hour. Since these were male masseurs (the
only kind available in this room), they only cost 20 RMB. We went
over and proceeded to be prodded, pounded and pulled from head to toe for
twenty minutes; it felt really good.

From there it was another shower and,
just to take full advantage of the situation, we went over to the other
long wall, lined with sinks, and brushed our teeth and shaved with the
complementary toothbrushes and razors. The toothpaste was squeezed and
the shaving cream was put on my hand by an attendant. The razor was so
cheap that it proved completely ineffective, so we quickly gave up on
shaving. The only thing left to do was take a dip in the separate sliver
of the pool that was filled with cold water, but declining to try that we
went instead to the next stage of the bathhouse experience.

The next room was a sort transition
room; there was a wall with four primping areas, complete with creams,
cologne and hairbrushes. In the middle of the room was an attendant to
help us into our co-ed bathhouse lounging attire. At this point both
being naked and being waited on had lost most of their novelty. Even so,
when the attendant helped me into my disposable underwear, I was
surprised. Feeling very clean, Charlie and I went upstairs, past the life
size painting of a beautiful servant woman and found Sera and Felicia
waiting in the lounge. Back to Sera…

The second floor lounges were co-ed.
However, we soon noticed that the female patrons and male masseurs tended
to be in one room, while the male patrons and scantily-clad female
masseuses congregated in the larger room. If there were any gay people in
this bathhouse, they were in the closet. However, the prostitutes, a
whole army of them, were not in any closets. They were lined up along a
bench in the predominantly male side of the lounge. Most of the
prostitutes at this swanky bathhouse were lithe collegiate women, wearing
identical blue evening gowns and plenty of makeup and sparkle. The
bathhouse functions as their pimp, undoubtedly taking a large cut of their
profits, but paying the appropriate bribes and providing some protection
in return. Although prostitutes are technically illegal in China (just
like pirated DVDs), they thrive in bathhouses and karaoke bars, and
everyone knows it. In a way, I think this is better, because at least
they’re not on the streets or strung out on drugs.

The lounge was beautiful and tended
to resemble the first-class section of an airplane, with large sofa-like
chairs, thin blankets, personal flat-screen TVs, and dim mood lighting.
Felicia and I chose to wait for Zac and Charlie in the female room because
the sight of many female masseuses kneeling before middle-aged business
men providing foot massages was a bit disturbing. As soon as we sat down
and started playing with the TV, attendants appeared and asked if we
wanted drinks. We said no. Then the masseurs came, offering massages.
We didn’t really feel like forking over the extra money for these
massages, so we declined. But they kept coming. “Would you like a head
massage?” A few seconds later, “How about a foot massage?” Then,
“Perhaps a shoulder massage would interest you?” Figuring out we were
cheapskates, “How about a hand massage?” and the final bid, “Don’t you
want to try a traditional Chinese massage?” Felicia dutifully translated
all of this for me, until Zac and Charlie finally came up. We had been
joking that they must have found some prostitutes, because we couldn’t
figure out why they had taken longer than us. We compared our respective
bathing experiences and quickly learned that all was not equal in the
bathing world. Felicia and I were envious of their pool.

Since bathhouses and prostitutes are
a novelty for Zac and me, we discussed a lot about the bathhouse culture.
We learned that rich people come to these expensive bathhouses maybe a
couple of times a month, to relax and enjoy the atmosphere. Not everyone
will partake of the prostitutes, although if someone really comes to the
bathhouses a lot, we should be suspicious. Businesses can also treat their
prestigious clients to services at the bathhouse. This bathhouse cost
39RMB ($4.80) just for entry, and all scrubbings, drinks, and massages
cost extra. The mid-level bathhouses cost 15-20 RMB for entry, offer all
the same services, but are less clean and have less diligent attendants.
But most Chinese people frequent the common bathhouses, which can cost as
little as 3RMB for entry. At those bathhouses, you have to bring all your
own soaps and towels and they’re quite crowded.

Although we experienced a Chinese
bathhouse first-hand, the enigma remained: Why not have a comfortable bath
at home? Our Chinese friends provided a variety of reasons. First of
all, it’s a tradition that is ingrained in their culture. For a long
time, houses simply didn’t have bathing facilities, so everyone had to go
to local bathhouses. The perception still lingers that you will get
cleaner at a bathhouse than at home. Some people who favor therapeutic,
multi-hour showers go to the bathhouse because it is cheaper than
showering at home where you have to pay for water and the electricity to
heat it. Students who live in the university dormitories have no
alternative for showering other than their campus bathhouse. Sometimes it
is just more convenient to shower at the bathhouse since showers in the
home aren’t always designed very well—resulting in flooding and molding.
Some go for the massages, skin-scrubbings, saunas and prostitutes. Others
go to the lavish bathhouses for the relaxing atmosphere and the feeling of
being waited upon. And who knows, maybe some go to celebrate their
birthday suit. We went out of curiosity, and I’m glad we did, but I think
I’ll just continue to have a comfortable bath at home.